No label defined (Q4549543)

It is well known that the only finite group which may act freely on an even-dimensional sphere is of order 2. It is also easy to see that if a finite group acts freely on a product of \(n\)-copies of even-dimensional spheres then the group is a 2-group of rank less than or equal to \(n\). As a consequence, many questions about existence of free action of finite groups on product of spheres were asked and many such results are now known due to the work of Browder, Carlsson, Cusick, Conner, Davis, S. Deo, Maitra and Milgram and many others. In this article the author gives answer to some particular cases of the following question. Suppose that the group \(\mathbb{Z}_q^r\), \(q\) a prime, acts freely on the product of spheres \(S_1^n\times S_2^n\times \cdots\times S_l^n\). Is then \(r\leq l\)? \textit{J. A. Daccach} and \textit{J. P. Vieira} [Manuscr. Math. 91, No. 4, 511-523 (1996; Zbl 0872.57041)] obtained a necessary condition for the group \(\mathbb{Z}_q^r\), \(q\) a prime, to act freely on product of spheres and using this they proved results about non-existence of free actions of \(\mathbb{Z}_q^r\) on certain products of three and four spheres of different dimensions. In the present paper, the author using this necessary condition proves results about non-existence of free actions of \(\mathbb{Z}_q^6\) on the product of five spheres. For the entire collection see [Zbl 0979.00028].